प्रीणनः सर्वभूतानां हृद्यो मांसरसः परम् ॥
(Meat soup is supremely pleasing to all living beings and is pleasing for the heart.)
—Charaka Samhita
All the beginnings have their own beginning. But you have to read between the lines. So, when the bulldozers arrive to dismantle history and trucks follow to fill the empty space with myths, there is a back story that is usually missed. The last bit we see is the culmination of a long process, which involves preparing the ground, seeding the myth and nurturing it quietly until it shows its face in all its terrifying aspects.
It could start with a school showing discomfort at children having meat for lunch, pushing them into bringing their tiffin box into conformity with “purity”, a councillor complaining about the smell of fish, or a housing society making sure only vegetarians can rent a unit.
Alongside are what we could call the “dietary evangelists”. Here’s one recent example:
“हम बंगाल के हिंदुओं से प्रार्थना कर रहे हैं... कि नवरात्रि में भले ही मूर्ति मत रखो, लेकिन प्रतिमा के पास या पंडाल के पीछे नॉन-वेज मत बेचो, मत खाओ। मुझे यह बात बिल्कुल अच्छी नहीं लगती कि दुर्गा पूजा में गंदा-गंदा कुकिंग हो, नॉन-वेज खाया जाए... ऐसे लोग जो पंडाल के नीचे या आसपास ऐसा करते हैं, वे धार्मिक नहीं हैं, वे पाखंडी हैं। कोलकाता के हिंदू जागो और ऐसे लोगों का बहिष्कार करो।”
(This is our request to Bengali Hindus. If someone doesn’t want to keep an icon during Navaratri, it is all right with us. But please refrain from eating or selling non-veg [sic] near the installed icons. I cannot abide the thought of meat eating during Durga Puja. The people who do this are apostate and Kolkata’s Hindus should boycott them).
As the people of the delta sharply reacted to this rant, the self-styled godman and author backtracked with his tail between the legs, even claiming to be a pupil of Ramkrishna and Vivekananda. Shastri sans Shastra is an ugly sight, for sure.
Predictably, Bengal broke out in outrage, citing its Shākta background and historical food habits. While the anger is justified, it skipped the larger picture. Until a few centuries ago, Indians and Hindus were as happy meat eaters as anyone else. And the largest section of them continues its carnivorous ways even today.
These “nouveau-Sanatanis” are passionate about their mission but their defence of “Vedic traditions” is misplaced. These “purity” peddlers trying to project India as a country of vegetarians are backed by an army of omniscient self-styled orientalists, whose expertise is fed by social media. It is hard to find a more ignorant tribe.
Even though the loudest noise is heard in Bengal, militant vegetarianism is everywhere. While one “pure vegetarian” seeks public assistance to negotiate with the stench of seafood in public places, another nearly gets herself hospitalised, overpowered by the smell of biryani from a distance. It doesn’t stop there. During the recent Kanwar yatra, entire cities were officially declared meat-free, mutton shops and shops selling cooked meat forced to shut down in the name of Sanatan Dharam. The assault on “impure cuisine” is now reaching epidemic proportions.
The so-called “Cow Belt”—Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, etc—long ago formed its idea about the rest of the country’s food habits and crystallised it over cow slaughter. Former Chief Justice of Guwahati High Court and acting chairman of the National Commission on Cattle 2002, Ghuman Mal Lodha, quoted commission chairman Dharampal: “Nineteenth-century India, dominated and conquered by the British, was among other things, also a major playground for the display of the benefits and virtues of animal slaughter and consumption of animal flesh. Starting from Madras and Calcutta in the late 18th century, propagation of meat eating was taken up by the British, especially the Protestant Christian missionaries to every nook and corner of India.”
Historical realities apart, this part of Dharampal’s opinion is of a piece with the stated revulsion of the neo-Sanatanis towards meat and the culture associated with it. From the Kavadias (kanwariyas) of north India to the “Shastri-sans-Shāstra”—or a scholar without scholarship—is merely a continuation of the same strain of thought. Perhaps a reference to the shastras will help to clear some of the fog surrounding the Vedic notions of an appropriate diet.
In the Rigveda, the most important of the Gods was Indra. He is certainly the most frequently mentioned in this canonical work. By this account, he also had a gigantic appetite. In the Vṛsākapi Sukta of the tenth mandala, we find Indra saying “उक्ष्णो हि मे पञ्चदश साकं पचन्ति विंशतिम् ।/ उताहमद्मि पीव इदुभा कुक्षी पृणन्ति मे ॥” (RV, X.86.14) (they cook fifteen-twenty oxen for me at a time and then I eat the fat and they fill my belly). Before he set out to fight the great Vṛtrasura, he had to be propitiated with adequate food and wine.
“वर्धा॒न् यं विश्वे॑ म॒रुतः॑ सजो॑षाः पच॑च्छ॒तं म॑हि॒षाँ इन्द्र॒ तुभ्य॑म् ।पू॒षा विष्णु॑स्त्रिक॒द्रुके॑षु सोमं॑ दु॒ह्वन्न् मदा॑य वि॒श्वधाय॑से ॥” (For him the Maruts, all with one accord, let grow the strength, and Pūṣan cooked for thee, O Indra, a hundred buffaloes; And Viṣṇu and Pūṣan milked the Soma juice for thee at the Trikadrukas, for thy delight who nourishest all.)
The Vedic people were not by any means plant-eaters, nor were their gods.
Since by Sanatani logic the Vedas are apaurushey—without the authorship of any man and thereby primal—the divine food habits should, logically speaking, also share the same characteristics. Why do Sanatanis look down on the food of the Gods?
It is not Indra alone, meat or beef, if you please, is generously offered to other Ṛgveda deities. We see Agni being invoked, “उ॒क्षान्ना॑य व॒शान्ना॑य सो॒मपृ॑ष्ठाय वे॒धसे॑ ।/ स्तोमै॑र्विधेमा॒ग्नये॑” (Let us serve Agni with our hymns, disposer, fed on ox and cow, who bears the Soma on his back.)
Clearly, whatever they were, the Vedic people were not by any means plant-eaters, nor were their gods. Taittirīya Brāhmaṇa clearly declares “अथो॒ अन्नं॒ वै प॒शुः।” (Moreover, livestock is verily food)
While cattle were a symbol of riches, they were not sacred animals as the Sanatanis would have us believe. In the Taittirīya Brāhmaṇa, Aśvamedha-kāṇḍa we see “... गामालभते । यज्ञो वै गौः । यज्ञमेवालभते । अथो अन्नं वै गौः । अन्नमेवावरुन्द्धे ॥” ([At the horse-sacrifice] he [the Adhvaryu] seizes [binds] the cow (i.e. cows). The cow is the sacrifice. [Consequently] it is the sacrifice he [the Sacrifice]) thus obtains. And the cow certainly is food. (Consequently) it is food he thus obtains.)
Prof. D. N. Jha in his The Myth of the Holy Cow notes, “Whether or not the Vedic Aryans ate consecrated and sacrificed beef or other animal flesh, the heart of the matter is that milch cattle including the cow was not sacrosanct during the Vedic and post-Vedic centuries. The term aghnya / aghnyā (lit. 'not to be slain') has been used at four places in the Ṛgveda and the Atharvaveda 'as a masculine noun equivalent to bull or ox and 42 times with a feminine ending to mean a cow’..."
However, calling cattle aghnya did not in any way make them sacred. It appeared to be an economic categorisation. Shatapatha Brāhamana notes “तद्वै समृद्धं यत्र कनीयांसो भार्या भूयांसः पशवः । तद्ध्यसमृद्धं यत्र भूयांसो भार्याः कनीयांसः पशवः ॥” (He is prosperous, who has less wives [alternatively, dependents] and more animals. He is unprosperous who has less animals and more wives [alternatively dependents])
Animals were killed for feast as required. In Ṛgveda again we see अघासु हन्यन्ते गावोऽर्जुनीषु वि उह्यते ॥ (Cows are killed in the constellation of Aghās (Magha) and (the bride) is carried away in Arjuni [Falguni])
The killing of a cow in honour of a guest was so entrenched in Vedic culture that it impacted the lexicon as well.
In fact, a welcome to any guest of note without offering meat was never complete. The arrival of a guest, essentially, meant slaughter of an animal and, more often than not, of a cow.
The welcome treat, or Arghya/ Madhuparka, contained meat. Āshvalayan Gṛhyasutra, a Sanskrit text on early Vedic ritual and practises, lays it out with absolute clarity: “नामांसो मधुपर्को भवति भवति ॥” No Madhuparka is without meat. It never is. Repeating the verb भवति twice makes it non-negotiable.
However, the Āpastambha Gṛhyasutra leaves it to the guest’s discretion whether or not to eat meat at the given time. Detailing the process elaborately it notes: “Cow is prepared for slaughter. If he [the guest] wants to release her he is to utter offering as: [she is] mother of Rudras, daughter of the Vasus, and say Om! Release her and give her grass. If the animal is slaughtered, [the guest] offers oblation of blood spread over ghee, sprinkling ghee over it in the fire saying [you are] blood Swadha homage.”
While honouring the guest’s choice to refrain, the Āpastambha Gṛhyasutra and others go on to detail the slaughter and subsequent procedure of food offering and consumption.
Hidden in this liturgy is probably the single most important Vedic source material for the lettered Sanatanis to deify the bovine. Note directive 6 that contains the utsarga ṛcha, or offering mantra, “माता रुद्राणां दुहिता वसूनामित्युत्सर्गं”. Now this is drawn from the Ṛgveda and also finds mention in Vājasaneyi Saṃhitā, a collection of mantras on Vedic rituals and animal sacrifice, in its full articulation states: “माता रुद्राणां दुहिता वसूनां स्वसादित्यनाममृतस्य नाभिः ।प्र नु वोचं चिकितुषे जनाय मा गामनागामदितिं वधिष्ट ॥”
Meaning “she is the mother of Rudras, daughter of Vasus, sister of Ādityas, navel of ambrosia. I proclaim to the discerning people do not slay the sinless inviolable cow”. Often quoted in isolation, this provides the perfect ladder for the bovine to climb to deification.
Without this, it is slaughtered and consumed and its use remains specifically restricted to guests’ voluntary refusal to partake of the flesh of a particular bovine, for whatever reason.
But the discussion here is not about the divine bovine. It concerns the habit of eating what neo-Sanatanis describe as “filthy food” (ganda khana). Our guest may not like beef, but there are other animals to be eaten. And going by P. V. Kane, the eminent Sankrit scholar and historian, the Āśvalāyana Gṛhyasūtra dates back to 600-400 BCE while Āpastamba Gṛhyasūtra belongs to 450–350 BCE.
The killing of a cow in honour of a guest was so entrenched in Vedic culture that it impacted the lexicon as well.
When a bovine is released by the guest, goat or lamb is offered instead. The reference is in Mānava Gṛhyasūtra of Kṛṣṇa Yajurveda, Maitrāyaṇī Śākhā: उत्सृष्टायामन्यं छागं वा मेषं वा संज्ञपयन्ति ॥ (With the cow released they slaughter a goat or a ram), or Vārāha Gṛhyasūtra of Kṛṣṇa Yajurveda: “उत्सृजतेति ब्रूयान्मांसं चेत्सिद्धं भवति ॥” (In case other meat has been cooked, he should say “release”).
In his commentary on Apastambha (1100 to 1300 CE), Haradatta Misra writes “यद्युत्सृजेत् तथाप्यन्येन मांसेन भोजनं भवति, 'नामांसो मधुपर्कः' इति वचनात् । (Even if (that particular bovine) is released, the food will contain meat due to the dictum no Madhuparka without meat.) Misra is not apologetic.
Similarly, Gargya Narayana around the 16th century in his commentary on Āsvalāyana Gṛhyasūtra writes “गव्ये उत्सृष्टेऽपि छागादिमांसं कार्यम् । कुतः ? ‘नामांसो मधुपर्को भवति’ इति नियमात् ।” (Even if the cow is released, meat of goat or other animals has to be prepared. Why? Due to the rule “no Madhuparka without meat”
The Vedic people took their hospitality so seriously that the maxim “no Madhuparka without meat” appears in several canonical texts including Mānava Gṛhyasūtra, Śāṅkhāyana Gṛhyasūtra, Baudhāyana Gṛhyasūtra, Vasiṣṭha Dharmasūtra, apart from Āpastamba.
The killing of a cow in honour of a guest was so entrenched in Vedic culture that it impacted the lexicon as well. Panini in one of the nipātan sutras in Ashtādhyayī writes दाशगोघ्नौ संप्रदाने.
In seventh century, one of the most prominent commentaries on Ashtādhyayī, Kāśikāvṛtti, explains the Sutra as “गोघ्नोऽतिथिः । कस्मात् ? तदर्थं गां घ्नन्ति इति ।” (Goghna [means] guest. Why? [because] cow is killed for him.)
In the early 17th century, Bhattoji Dikshita in his Vaiyākaraṇa-Siddhānta-Kaumudī explained the Sūtra “दाशगोघ्नौ संप्रदाने ॥ दीयतेऽस्मै दाशः । गां हन्त्यस्मै गोघ्नोऽतिथिः ॥” (Dās and Goghna in case of saṃpradāna [giving]. Given to him [दीयते] Dās. Cow killed for him. Goghna guest), without ascribing any rejection of meat in the interpretation. Beef was a preferred food and killing a cow for a guest widely associated with status.
The hedgehog, the porcupine, the monitor lizard, the rhinoceros, the tortoise, and the hare; as well as animals with a single row of incisors, with the exception of the camel are permitted for eating traditionally.
Meat was an integral part of daily life and it started early. Across several Gṛhyasūtras, the first solid feeding of a child entails meat of various birds and animals.
Āśvalāyana Gṛhyasūtra ordains: “Annaprāshana in the sixth month. Wishing the child abundance of food, serve rice mixed with curd, honey and ghee. Wishing intellect of speech and mind, feed flesh of a bird. Wishing agility, feed fish. Wishing long life, feed [flesh of] deer, wishing spiritual lustre feed [flesh of] skylark. Wishing all of it feed everything [mixed together].” Almost similar directions are provided across Śāṅkhāyana Gṛhyasūtra, Pāraskara Gṛhyasūtra and others.
Not just the first feeding, the right kind of meat was prescribed even for conceiving the right kind of child. Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad famously prescribes: “अथ य इच्छेत्पुत्रो मे पण्डितो विगीतः समितिंगमः शुश्रूषितां वाचं भाषिता जायेत सर्वान्वेदाननुब्रुवीत सर्वमायुरियादिति, मांसौदनं पाचयित्वा सर्पिष्मन्तमश्नीयाताम्; ईश्वरौ जनयितवै—औक्षेण वार्षभेण वा ॥” (Now one who desires a son, [who would be] frequenting the committees, a well versed speaker, a master of all vedas and lives a long life, the progenitors should cook and eat rice mixed with meat of a young bull or a breeding bull along with clarified butter.)
It was of primary importance even in Shrāddha, the last rites of a person. Manusmṛti says if a Brahmin invited for a Shraddha refuses to eat the consecrated meat, he is reborn as animal fat for 21 births. “नियुक्तस्तु यथान्यायं यो मांसं नात्ति मानवः ।/स प्रेत्य पशुतां याति संभवानेकविंशतिम् ॥” (After being appointed [as the Brahmin], a man who refuses to eat duly consecrated meat attains rebirth as an animal for 21 lifetimes.)
While denouncing killing animals for food, Manu goes into great detail on the length of satisfaction of the pitṛs with various kinds of meat and other offerings.
“तिलैर्व्रीहिभिर्यवैर्माषैरद्भिर्मूलफलेन वा ।दत्तेन मासं तृप्यन्ति विधिवत्पितरो नृणाम् ॥/ द्वौ मासौ मत्स्यमांसेन त्रीन्मासान्हारिणेन तु ।औरभ्रेणाथ चतुरः शाकुनेनेह पञ्च वै ॥/ षण्मासांश्छागमांसेन पार्षतेन च सप्त वै ।अष्टावेणस्य मांसेन रौरवेण नवैव तु ॥ २६८ ॥/ दश मासांस्तु तृप्यन्ति वराहमहिषामिषैः ।शशकूर्मयोस्तु मांसेन मासानेकादशैव तु ॥/ संवत्सरं तु गव्येन पयसा पायसेन च ।वार्ध्रीणसस्य मांसेन तृप्तिर्द्वादशवार्षिकी ॥कालशाकं महाशल्काः खड्गलोहामिषं मधु ।आनन्त्यायैव कल्प्यन्ते मुन्यन्नानि च सर्वशः ॥” (The pitṛs stay satisfied for a month with the rice, barley, black gram, water, or roots and fruits offered properly. With flesh of fish, three, with deer’s meat, with lamb’s meat four and with flesh of bird they stay satisfied for five months. With goat’s meat [they stay satisfied] for six months, with that of a spotted deer seven months, with the meat of a black deer for eight and with that of a Ruru deer nine. The meat of wild boar and buffalo keeps them satisfied for ten months and that of tortoise and hare for eleven months. Payas made from cow’s milk keeps them satisfied for a year while the meat of a vārdhrīṇasa (often interpreted as an old goat) satisfies them for 12 years. Kālaśāka (a herb), fish with great scales, flesh of rhinoceros, red goat, honey and wild forest grains keep them satisfied for eternity.)
In Mahābhārata, Bhishma quotes Manu almost in toto while discussing Shrāddha kalpa with Yudhiṣṭhira. Manu was walking a tightrope. On the one hand, he had to deal with the growing influence of Buddhism and its notions of Ahimsā. Simultaneously, he also couldn’t alienate his own constituency or his own dietary habits.
In the fifth adhyay of Manusmṛti, we find, “नाकृत्वा प्राणिनां हिंसां मांसमुत्पद्यते क्वचित् ।न च प्राणिवधः स्वर्ग्यस्तस्मान्मांसं विवर्जयेत् ॥” (Meat cannot be obtained without violence against living beings, and killing animals obstruct heavens. Thus, meat is to be avoided.)
Manu then adds significant caveats to define violence and justify meat eating.
“या वेदविहिता हिंसा नियतास्मिंश्चराचरे ।अहिंसामेव तां विद्याद्वेदाद्धर्मो हि निर्बभौ ॥” (The violence ordained in the Vedas across the world is to be considered as non-violence. Dharma itself has evolved from the Vedas). He points out that one can eat meat by buying or rearing one’s own animals, or meat offered by others after worshipping the gods and pitṛ. That won’t incur sin.
While clearly proscribing meat, he prescribes an exhaustive list of meats for eating: “He who eats the flesh of one animal is known by the eater of that animal flesh [but] one who eats fish is considered the eater of all flesh and hence fish [eating] is to be avoided. Sheet fish and Rohu fish can be consumed if used in rituals, Rājiva, Sinhatunda and all scaled fish too can be consumed. Animals which wander alone or are unknown are not to be eaten even if they appear fit for consumption, as are animals with five claws. The hedgehog, the porcupine, the monitor lizard, the rhinoceros, the tortoise, and the hare; as well as animals with a single row of incisors, with the exception of the camel are permitted for eating traditionally.”
Hunting game and its consumption was a regular part of life even in Rāmayana. So, when Rāvana arrives in the forest in the guise of a Brāhman ascetic, Sitā casually tells him to wait and rest, while her husband returns from hunting animals like the ruru deer, wild boar, and buffaloes (mahiṣa) and she will offer him pure meat.
It is not only the Maryada Purushottam and his people who enjoyed meat of various kinds. One wonders how the nouveau-awoke Sanatanis will react to Sitā’s promise to the Ganga while crossing her for the 14-year exile.
Sitā promised “सुराघटसहस्रेण मांसभूतौदनेन च ।यक्ष्ये त्वां प्रयता देवि पुरीं पुनरुपागता ॥” (Once I return to the city safely, I shall worship you with thousand pitchers of liquor and rice cooked with meat). Against this, we have the case of people arrested for holding a non-veg party on a boat in Varanasi. Sitā offered a thousand pitchers of liquor and meat to Gangā herself.
As Rāma moved deeper into the forest, Bharata, as Vālmiki in Rāmayana Ayodhyakānda describes, decides to follow Rāma to forest and attempt to persuade him to return. He enters the forest with his mothers, courtiers and army, and arrives at the hermitage of Bharadwāja Ṛshi at Prayāga. Bharadwāja was a Brahmin.
In keeping with tradition, Bharadwāja organises a feast for the royal entourage. “ऋतूनुच्चावचान्देवान्गन्धर्वांश्च सनातनान् ।अन्नं च विविधं स्वादु भक्ष्यं भोज्यं च चोष्यकम् ॥ लेह्यं च विविधं भूयः स्रजश्चापि मनोहराः ।मद्यं च विविधं स्वादु दिव्यं तत्प्रविधीयताम् ॥” (Oh Gods and Gandharvas, (may the varied and delicious foods be prepared which are to be chewed, swallowed, sucked, and licked—together with enchanting flower garlands and various divine, sweet, wines.)
As the feast starts taking shape, mountains of meat, hare, wild boar, buffalo, rooster, peacock, ritually pure deer cooked on spits, game from the southern land, Rohit and thousands of other varieties of fish appeared. “शशकानां वराहाणां महिषाणां च संचयाः । बभूवुः कृकवाकूणां मयूराणां च संचयाः ॥/ तत्र शूल्यैर्मृगैर्मेध्यैस्तथा दाक्षिणवल्गुभिः ।रोहितैश्चापि वारण्यैर्मत्स्यैश्चापि सहस्रशः”
But what Vālmiki’s further description reveals is way more interesting. He writes “कौक्कुटाश्च मयूराश्च तथा तित्तिरिनिःस्वनाः ।भाजनैः पृथगेवापि निहिताः संस्कृता भृशम् ॥/ दधिस्निग्धैः सुगन्धैश्च मांसैः स्वादुभिरन्वितान् ।सूपान्बहून्विचित्रांश्च रससंभारसंस्कृतान् ॥” (skilfully cooked and well-seasoned poultry, peafowl and partridges were laid out in separate vessels. Meat treated with smooth curd and aromatic (spices), various kinds of broths with rich extracts were laid out).
Clearly, the culinary arts had reached a great height when processing meat even in the hermitage of a Brahmin sage.
In Mahābharata, we have seen how Bhīshma quotes Manu on the satisfaction of pitṛs over various kinds of flesh offerings. While the epic is replete with detailed descriptions of a wide variety of meat, the episode of Dharmavyādha in Vanaparva stands out for the philosophical clarity of subaltern groups on the notion of non-violence and perception of Dharma.
Kaushika, a Brahmin ascetic, proud over his solitary penance and scriptural learning incinerates an egret with a mere angry look after it defecates on him. He sets out to seek alms and approaches a woman, who takes her time to serve him. Angered by the delay, Kaushika casts a wrathful glance. She calmly tells him she is no egret to be burnt with his angry gaze, so he can keep his rage to himself.
A surprised Kaushika seeks to know the source of her power. She directs him to Mithila to meet a butcher, Dharmavyādha, to learn the essence of Dharma. Kaushika travels to Mithila to find him selling meat of deer, buffalo, pork, etc. Revulsed by the sight, the adherent to purity (शुचिप्रियः) Brahmin stands at a distance.
Seeing him from a distance, the Vyādha approaches with folded hands and says he knows about his accomplishments and reasons for travelling to Mithila. Kaushika expresses his bewilderment at the apparent discrepancy between his knowledge and vocation, which leads to the Vyādha in a masterclass systematically revealing the hypocrisy behind the notion of physical purity.
Stating that he is only continuing the profession his ancestors practised, Vyādha says, “नाहं हन्मि पशून् विप्र विक्रीणामि मृतं त्वहम् ।परैर्हतानां मांसानां क्रयविक्रयकारकः ॥न खादाम्यहमेतानि न च मेऽस्ति परिग्रहः ।” (I do not kill these animals [but only] sell the meat of animals killed by others after buying it from them. I also don’t eat or hoard meat out of greed.)
He proceeds to destroy the Ahimsā argument against universal violence. “अहिंसा सत्यवचनं सर्वभूतहितं परम् ।अहिंसा परमो धर्मः स च सत्ये प्रतिष्ठितः ॥” “केवलं न विजानन्ति मूढा धर्ममनादृतम् ।भूयिष्ठं हि जगत् सर्वं हिंसाव्याप्तं द्विजोत्तम ॥” (Non-violence, speaking truth and seeking welfare are great [notions]. Non-violence is the greatest dharma, that is also established in truth. But the idiots who don’t appreciate Dharma, oh great Brahmin, do not know that the entire universe is pervaded by violence.)
Taking the agrarian claim of purity through non-violence to the cleaners he goes on: “कृषौ हि जायंते जीवाः खनमानेन मेदिनीम् ।बहवः पृथिवीस्थाश्च हन्यन्ते न विदुस्तथा ॥” (Numerous living beings die when the land is ploughed for agriculture but men do not take cognition of it.)
Positioning the Vyādha in a meat market establishes a well-entrenched meat economy in the society of that time.
“वृक्षांश्च तृणगुल्मांश्च छिन्दन्ति पुरुषा द्विज ।तत्रापि बहवः सत्त्वाः स्थावराणां विनाशने ॥/जलस्थानि च सत्त्वानि बहुलानि महीतले ।अविज्ञातानि हन्यन्ते तत्र किं प्रतिभाति ते ॥” (Men cut down trees, grass and shrubs, O Brahmin. Many living beings perish with the destruction of vegetation. There are living beings in water across the world who are killed without knowledge. What does appear to you there?)
Apart from providing a theoretical rejection of the agrarian notion of non-violence, this episode provides us with crucial glimpses of contemporary society and perceptions about so-called purity on the one hand and, on the other, the growing intellectual influence of Buddhism.
For one thing, positioning the Vyādha in a meat market, juxtaposed with several other detailed process of cooking of meat, unarguably establishes a well-entrenched meat economy in the society of that time. Secondly, the idea of physical purity is debated and dealt with intellectually. Third, and most importantly, from Manu to Mahabharata, the influence of Buddhist principles was gaining ground socially.
By the time of the Buddha, the meat economy was well established. Markets had outlets selling meat without society looking down at the practice. In the Potaliya Sutta of Majjhima Nikaya (a collection of discourses by Buddha and his disciples), while talking to a wealthy householder Potaliya, Buddha uses a simile of a butcher’s shop casually.
“Householder, suppose a dog, overcome by hunger and weakness, was waiting by a butcher's shop. Then a skilled butcher or his apprentice would cut out a skeleton of meatless bones smeared with blood and toss it to the dog. What do you think, householder? Would that dog get rid of his hunger and weakness by gnawing such a skeleton of meatless bones smeared with blood?”
From Manusmṛti to Dharmavyādha in the Mahābharata, to Potaliya Sutta, the evidence for a well-established meat economy is strong. While Manu accepts one can buy meat without incurring sin, Dharmavyādha makes it clear that he doesn’t kill animals but buys them from hunters and in Majjhima Nikaya, the matter-of-fact reference to a butcher’s shop makes it clear that trading of animal flesh was common. The demand for a portion of animal flesh rather than an entire animal for sacrifice would have come from regular consumers. So, there must have been enough demand for meat to justify the butcher’s.
While Buddha preached non-harm, he was pragmatic in his approach towards consumption of meat. He permitted consumption by the monks, refused to declare a blanket ban on its consumption, as demanded by some hardliners.
In Jīvaka Sutta of the Majjhima Nikaya, when Jīvaka Komārabhacca confronts Buddha his response is, “Jivaka, I say there are three instances in which meat should not be eaten: when it is seen, heard, or suspected [that the living being has been slaughtered for the bhikkhu]. I say that there are three instances in which meat may be eaten: when it is not seen, not heard, and not suspected [that the living being has been slaughtered for the bhikkhu].”
Later in the Vinaya Piṭaka, when Devadatta makes an attempt to get Buddha endorse compulsory vegetarianism, Buddha not only categorically denies him, but goes on to reiterate his stand. “Fish and flesh are pure in respect of three points: if they are not seen, heard or suspected (to have been killed on purpose for him).
The importance of a protein diet was acknowledged in Ayurveda.
In Āmagandha Sutta, Buddha when confronted by an ascetic about him eating flesh, and being defiled by the stench of carrion, says “taking life, torture, mutilation, too, binding, stealing, telling lies, and fraud; deceit, adultery, and studying crooked views: this is carrion-stench, not the eating of meat”.
Instances of societal consumption of meat are aplenty in Jain literature as well. However, as compared to Buddhism’s more liberal approach, Jains hardened their stand on vegetarianism significantly over time.
The importance of a protein diet was significantly acknowledged in Ayurveda as well and Charaka has gone to great lengths to list the varieties of animal flesh to be administered to patients for various ailments. From fish to birds and large animals, Charaka details the medicinal properties of all kinds of meat. Sample this: “Pork imparts strength, is tasty, heavy and sweat generating. Beef is beneficial in exclusive vāta, chronic rhinitis and intermittent fever, dry cough, fatigue, high metabolism, and muscle wasting. Buffalo meat is heavy, oily, hot, and aphrodisiac and is heavy (to digest), though deeply nourishing.”
In fact, he goes on to state “शरीरबृंहणेनान्यत्खाद्यंमांसाद्विशिष्यते॥” (No other food excels than meat in building up the body.)
For all practical purposes, casual consumption of meat was normal in Indian society. It is no surprise, therefore, to see a Brahmin Vidushak, Maitraya, salivating over meat preparations in Shudraka’s Mṛchchakatikam (a Sanskrit drama set in Ujjain’s urban life, 400-600 CE) as he describes the butcher boy cleaning the entrails of a dead animal in the kitchen of the courtesan Vasantasenā and the aroma from the kitchen.
Similarly, in the opening of the second act of Kālidāsa’s Abhijnana Shākuntalam, the Brahmin Vidushak laments over his gastronomical plight during King Dushyanta’s hunt. “अनियतवेलं शूल्यमांसभूयिष्ठ आहारो भुज्यते” (eating lot of food consisting of spit-roasted meat at irregular hours). While his plight is understandable, he doesn’t ever complain of the sanctity of food, but the irregularity and the coarseness of it that pains his stomach, used to more refined cuisine.
Again in the sixth act, a fisherman finds the royal ring while cutting a big Rohit fish. As he tries to sell it, he is arrested. When the soldiers berate him for the stench of fish, he has a profound response. “सहजं वीर किमपि निन्दितं न खलु कर्म विवर्जनीयम् ।पशुमारणकर्मदारुणोऽनुकम्पामृदुरेव श्रोत्रियः॥” (one shouldn’t give up the occupation inherited by birth. A Srotriya Brahmin who carries out the cruel act of animal sacrifice can still be soft in nature.)
This exposes another interesting part of the meat economy. While regular killing, butchering and sale of animal flesh was assigned to so-called lower castes, hunting was for the Kshatriyas and sacrificial killing was in the domain of Brāhmanas. Given the reactions of the Vidushak, it may not be wrong to assume consumption of meat from all sources was unrestricted.
By the time one arrives at Bānabhatta, the pattern is established and indications of mother goddess worship and animal sacrifice in temples start surfacing. In Kadambari, Bānabhatta’s 7th century romance, the picture of Chandika temple attests to animal sacrifice in Shakti temples.
Around the same time, one of the most important Shākta texts, Kalika Purāna was written in eastern India. It provides a detailed description of animal sacrifice during goddess worship. “मस्तु वलिदानस्य स्वरूपं रुधिरादितःI यथा स्यात् प्रीतये सम्यक् तद्वां वक्षामि पुत्रकौ॥/ वैष्णवीतन्त्रकल्पोक्तः क्रमः सर्वत्र सर्वदा।साधकैर्वलिदानस्य ग्राह्यं सर्वसुरस्य च॥” ६७/१(I am telling you sons the process and details of sacrifices that propitiates Devi. The worshippers stick to the sequence described in the Vaishnavitantrakalpa.)
“पक्षिणः कच्छपा ग्राहा मत्स्या नवविधा मृगाः। महिषों गोधिका गावश्छागो रुरुश्च शुकरः॥खड़्गश्च कृष्णसारश्च गोधिका शरभो हरिः।शार्दुलश्च नरश्चैव स्वगात्ररुधिरं तथा॥चण्डिकाभैरवादीना वलयः परिकीर्त्तिताः॥” (All kinds of birds, turtles, crocodiles, fishes, nine kinds of deer, buffalo, old goat, cow, young goat, ruru, pigs, rhinos, black bucks, monitor lizards, Sharabha, lion, tiger, man, blood from own body are considered sacrifices for Chandika and Bhairava.)
While Shākta practices were steadily gaining ground in literature, Shankaracharya in his commentary on the Bṛhadāranyaka Upanishad had no qualms accepting animal sacrifice and beef consumption.
Commenting on Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upanishad 6.4.18 as quoted earlier Shankaracharya wrote: “Now, he who wishes, 'May a son be born to me who will be a learned scholar (paṇḍitaḥ), widely renowned (vigītaḥ), a member of assemblies (samitīgaḥ), one who speaks speech that is delightful to hear (śuśrūṣitāṁ vācam), who may study all the Vedas (sarvān vedān anubrūvīta), and live the full span of life (sarvam āyur iyāt)'—having cooked rice mixed with meat (māṁsaudanam), both [husband and wife] should eat it with clarified butter (sarpiṣmantam); they become capable of producing such a son. [The meat should be] either that of a young bull/steer (aukṣa) or an older breeding bull (ārṣabha.)”
Shankaracharya defined polluted food and proscribed its consumption. He also left open the question of what to do in a life-and-death situation. Most importantly, he held the Vedic dictum prevailed over everything.
In the 12th century, Chalukya king Sômēśvara lll wrote his famous treatise Mānasollās that provides an extraordinary secular glimpse of the contemporary social and royal life including gastronomical expeditions.
“Sômēśvara while dealing with non-vegetarian food, states that only a specific part of each animal's body is suitable for eating. It is stated that meat of a pig is soft and sticky; that of säranga is healthy; of the black-buck is sweet, tasty and paletable; that of the deer is good for health (padhyam); while that of rabbit is dry; the meat of sheep is heavy but tasty and that of a goat is light. Further, fish meat gives heat and energy. The meat of sakuna bird is very light while that of ruru and sambra is very nutritious, healthy and increases appetite. Besides, there are variety of meats which are nutritious and tasty.” (Royal Life In Mānasôllāsa, P. Arundhati.)
Sômēśvara then goes into great detail about cleaning and preparing various kinds of meat and fishes with extensive prescriptions of various spices to accompany the meat.
The 16th century āyurvedic and culinary treatise Kṣemakutūhala provides an array of meat preparations from a wide variety of animals, birds and fishes.
Celebrating the virtues of meat, Kṣemaśarman, writer of the treatise says, “Finely minced meat is thoroughly steamed or parboiled in water infused with asafoetida (hiṅgu) and coriander seeds. It is then mixed with asafoetida, cumin seeds, fresh ginger, citron (bījapūra / citrus medica), cardamom, and rock salt. This mixture is fried in heated clarified butter (ghṛta) and lightly smoked/fumigated (dhūpita). This preparation is known as Māṃsa-pūraṇa (seasoned meat filling/stuffing. Pūrana is great appetiser, destroys vāta, pitta, kafa and lack of hunger and gives strength.)”
While Ādi Śaṅkarācārya (788–820 CE) prescribed ahiṁsā, he accepted Vedic rituals mandating animal sacrifice, Vallabhācārya (1479–1531 CE), however, radically accentuated the notion of purity in his Śuddhādvaita and Puṣṭimārga frameworks by adapting the concept of doṣa from the later Vedic and ritual liturgy. From a mere sacrificial technicality, he elevated the idea of purity into a disciplined platform for surrender of ego (samarpaṇa) and uncompromising devotional service (sevā).
While both samarpana and sevā were fundamental to his work, Vallabhacharya reclaimed the primacy of Gārhasthya over Sanyās and replaced the performance of Shrauta Karmakānda with bhakti (devotion).
The idea of Bhakti eliminated the need for a Brahmin mediator between the devotee and his God.
He pulled religion out of the clutch of patrons and saints to the kitchen of the Bhaktas (bhaktas are originally devotees and not political zombies, as we seem to understand today) and mandated sevā through body and wealth. He opens his Siddhant Muktavali with “चेतस्तत्प्रवणं सेवा तत्सिद्धयै तनुवित्तजा।” (Sevā is that state of mind where consciousness is wholly directed toward Him. To attain that state, one serves through the dedicated offering of body and wealth.)
This is where Vallabhacharya opened the gate for the mercantile communities to claim a bigger role in the religious hierarchy, otherwise denied under Manu’s prescription.
While Shrauta karmakānda was practically beyond the Vaishyas to participate in person other than as a sponsor, the idea of Bhakti eliminated the need for a Brahmin mediator between the devotee and his God. Secondly, the need for Vittaja (born of wealth) sevā sanctified their physical wealth as a means of “sevā”, giving them a central role in the socio-religious order. The obsession with purity intensified, as it required a lot of money to keep the impure away from the offerings to God.
The official recognition of Vitta (wealth) as an element of religiosity reconfigured the social matrix and led to sanskritisation of the mercantile communities. It gave them licence to assert their claim as defenders of religious morality, with a show of hyper-purity and visible opulence.
Vallabhācharya also facilitated mercantile sanskritisation by formally proclaiming the supremacy of Pusti or Bhaktimārg over Jnānamarg. It stripped the Brahmins of their forte, religious debate and logical discourses. The replacement was a tangible application of purity and opulent sevā, far easier for the mercantile communities.
In the 17th century, the real seat of Pushtimarg shifted to Rajasthan when the icon of Srī Nathji was shifted from Govardhan to Nathdwara in Mewar.
So, Marwari merchants became the principal financial lifeline to the establishment through their enhanced “samarpan” to the ideology and the deity, Vittaja (born of wealth) sevā largely remaining their core strength and lever to greater social acceptability.
The Jodhpur royal court even had to accommodate merchants in policy-making to ensure their financial support in dealing with Maratha invasions.
As Divya Cherian notes in her Merchants of Virtue: Hindus Muslims and Untouchables in Eighteenth Century South Asia, “In Marwar by the 18th century, it was merchants and to a lesser extent Brahmans who, as a caste, combined regional political authority with subcontinental fiscal power to muscle their way into the top of the region’s social order. Some Brahmin communities in Marwar such as the Palliwals and Nandwana Bohras were successful money lenders.” She mentions that the Jodhpur court reserved the second most important court post, Divān, for a merchant, largely men from the Oswal Jain community.
Brahmins claimed their high social rank through Vedic textual traditions and their scholarly functions, the entry of the merchant communities, votaries of “pure” seva with far stronger financial muscle, diluted their social primacy. The varied merchant communities came together and formed a “cohesive social unit’, which they called “Mahajan”, literally “great men.”
The rise of the mercantile community as a major political force, devoted to purity and vegetarianism, meant the meat trade was criminalised.
Cherian notes, “As early as 1764, around the time of Vijai Singh's formal initiation in 1765 into the Vallabhite sect, an unidentified officer issued a command on behalf of the crown to the jagirdar's men, peasant headmen (chaudharis), and the people of a village called Palyasani: ‘The court (darbār) has forbidden butchery (kasab karano) and yet it continues to occur in Palyasani. This is not all right. Do not permit butchery going forward. If it happens again then the butchers' hands will be cut off (pher huvai to kasāyāṁ rā hāth vadhsī) and they will be punished (sajhāvār husī).’
“Again, in 1775, the crown dispatched an order to Sambhar district in which it observed that the kasāīs (a Muslim caste of butchers) were continuing with their trade and urged the local authorities to put an end to the practice. The crown invoked the authority of the neighbouring Jaipur kingdom when commanding butchers to refrain from animal slaughter, stating that if they refused to comply, they would be presented with a written order from Jaipur.”
“The state escalated its efforts against the butchers. In 1784, it rounded up and jailed all the butchers of Nagaur, among the largest towns in the kingdom. Perhaps realizing just how difficult these measures were to sustain, the merchant-administrator Muhnot Gyanmal sent an order on behalf of the crown to the magistrate of Nagaur to expel all the butchers who were imprisoned there from the kingdom. To make sure that the command was executed, the magistrate was to send an escort (tathā kasāī jīv hamsyā bābat uthai kaid mai hai tiņā nu mulak bārai kādh den ro hukam huvo hai su uņā kasāyāṁ nu sāthai ādmi de nai mulak bārai kadhāy dejo śrī hajūr ro hukam chhai). We do not know of course if all the butchers of Nagaur were thrown out of Marwar, but given how widespread and sustained the campaign against animal slaughter in Marwar was during these decades, it is possible.”
Western Indian traders, like their counterparts in northern India studied by Chris Bayly, viewed social prestige and creditworthiness as inextricably related.
With the Mahajans, Goswami havelis and royal support concurring in Marwar, militant vegetarianism was growing roots and fast. While Mahajans asserted their dominance over the royal court, they also imposed their own version of purity over the state with an iron hand. Over time, the notion of stricter purity and devotion to deity evolved as a currency of credibility for the mercantile communities.
Douglas Haynes in his Rhetoric and Ritual in Colonial India the shaping of a public culture in Surat City 1852-1928, illustrates how the symbols of purity lent commercial credibility to the merchants.
“For high-caste Surtis, particularly for the city's merchants, the maintenance and improvement of reputation have always been central concerns. Members of the community employed a number of words for referring to their reputations: maan, pratishtha, ijat, and abru (all roughly translatable as honour, reputation, or prestige).
The notion of grand purity and its ostentatious display became an essential part of enhancing social credibility for the merchant communities.
“The most significant of these was the term abru, perhaps because it conveyed both senses in which reputation was critical to the Brahman-Vaniyas: as the economic credit of the family firm and as its perceived status in local society. This conflation of meaning was no coincidence. Integrity in business dealings contributed to a merchant's or banker's social standing. Conversely, a firm's ability to mobilise capital and to carry on transactions without exchanges of cash often depended on a family’s general image of respectability.”
Western Indian traders, like their counterparts in northern India studied by Chris Bayly, viewed social prestige and creditworthiness as inextricably related.
“Key to the acquisition and sustenance of abru was adherence to dharma, the sacred moral obligations that the community considered incumbent upon all of its members... From Brahmanical Hinduism came concerns with ritual inclusion and exclusion and with social ranking based upon relative levels of purity and impurity.”
The notion of grand purity and its ostentatious display became an essential part of enhancing social credibility for the merchant communities that soon spread out across the peninsula with the railways brought in by the British. Hand in hand with economic muscle building across the land, the urge to impose notions of purity started gaining ground and the process of redefining the religion through Pushtimarg accelerated.
To establish themselves as better Hindus, it was important to create a section of worse Hindu. Thus, the stereotypes were created and marketed. By the turn of the 21st century, the phenomenon of people being refused housing because of their culinary choice was almost normalised, as was public shaming of one’s food habits.
Probably the clearest attempt at reimagining history in line with this commercially convenient ideology surfaced in the Report of the National Commission on Cattle, 2002. The chair, Ghuman Mal Lodha, in this report claimed, “Cow slaughter in India first started around 1000 AD, when various Islamic invaders came to this country. According to Islamic traditions, in Arab countries they used to kill and sacrifice goats and sheep. On special occasions they used to sacrifice camels. However, the Islamic rulers were not habituated to beef-eating, as there were no cows in Arabic countries. When the invaders came to India, they started sacrificing cows, especially on the occasion of Bakri-Id. This was done more to humiliate the natives of this country and establish their sovereignty and superiority rather than for food purposes.”
In light of the textual explorations above, this claim is exposed as mere gibberish. Riding on the cow, vegetarianism arrived as a bid to get Hindus to rally behind an emotional cause. The most influential RSS Sarsanghchalak, the late M. S. Golwalkar, who was on the high-powered committee on cow protection formed in 1967, had—as quoted by Verghese Kurien—said a campaign on banning cow slaughter could unify India in five years.
“So, I tell you what, Kurien, you agree with me to ban cow slaughter on this committee and I promise you, five years from that date, I will have united the country. What I’m trying to tell you is that I’m not a fool, I'm not a fanatic. I’m just cold-blooded about this. I want to use the cow to bring out our Indianness,” Kurien quoted him as saying in his autobiography.
It’s taken some time but Bengal’s gastronomical delights have finally been declared “ganda khana” by a self-styled godman. The trajectory has always been logical, systematic and predictable. But the subcontinent has survived worse.
is a journalist based in Gujarat.
